Beginning in
2003 and continuing into the present, the Recording Industry Association of
America (RIAA) has commenced lawsuits against individuals thought to have
violated provisions in the Digital
Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). Sometimes the RIAA has won the legal
battles, sometimes not.

In September 2003, in a case of mistaken identity, the RIAA
withdrew its lawsuit against a sculptor, aged 66, who claimed she and her
husband never downloaded song-sharing software or used it numerous times—in
alleged violation of the DMCA. Sarah Seabury Ward of Massachusetts said that
she and her husband used their computer only to email
their children and grandchildren. They did not at any time download songs
illegally.

The Electronic
Frontier Foundation (EFF) assisted the woman in fighting her case. The
attorney handling the case argued that the elderly couple used a Macintosh
computer—on which the KaZaA file-sharing software they were allegedly using
cannot be run. Ward was one of 261 individuals sued by the RIAA for illegal
Internet file sharing. The accused illegally shared more than 2,000 music
titles, argued the RIAA. The RIAA eventually withdrew their case against Ward,
labeling the withdrawal a good-faith gesture. An RIAA spokesperson said that
they still believed the computer address provided by Comcast Corporation,
Ward’s Internet Service Provider,
was correct.

An attorney with the EFF said that more cases like Ward’s
will probably surface, given the difficulties of identifying IP addresses for
particular subscribers. Internet
Service Providers such as Comcast do not have enough IP addresses for each subscriber, so they do not assign
addresses to users permanently. Instead, providers assign IP addresses
dynamically when a user connects to the service. It is not easy to ascertain
which addresses are used by which specific account.